From the best source of classic cinema comes a new trivia card game that will challenge the savviest fans of a century of movie history. Turner Classic Movies’ Ultimate Movie Trivia Challenge is for anyone and everyone who has watched not only the Oscar-winning dramas and late-night noir marathons, but also paid attention to the hosts supplying behind-the-scenes trivia about the directors and stars. It’s just right for pulling out at a cocktail party of your fellow movie fans, but fair warning: It’s the kind of game where you’ll be lucky to score a right answer in every few cards.
I Love the ’80s was a ten-hour VH-1 series that waxed nostalgic for all things pop culture in the decade, and a new five-hour documentary strives to do the same thing with the sci-fi genre movies of the decade as its focus. In Search of Tomorrow: A Journey Through ’80s Sci-Fi Cinema is the result of a crowd-sourced project, now available for pre-order exclusively at the project’s website here. It is one of several projects we’ve seen like it over the years, the best being Must-See Sci-Fi (reviewed here), Turner Classic Movies’ guide to 50 significant science fiction movies, and James Cameron’s Story of Science Fiction (reviewed here), a book and series which gives insight into the genre’s most significant creations via interviews with the directors that made them. In Search of Tomorrow features only a handful of A-listers in its interviews–the advertised top talent being Peter Weller, Billy Dee Williams, Dee Wallace, and Nicholas Meyer. It pulls together a group of the few remaining actors, visual effects artists, and other creators behind the scenes who fans of the genre probably haven’t seen in decades (yes, it’s been more than 30 years since the 1980s). Writer/director David Weiner focuses on a swath of 54 movies that reflects the best–and the worst–of the decade.
It’s no wonder Netflix got its hooks into Ryan Reynolds (and he into them). With great films like Free Guy and 6 Underground, not to mention his Deadpool series, he’s becoming reliable–still far to go to become the next Tom Cruise, but well on his way. In his new movie The Adam Project, which started this weekend on Netflix, you get a lot: an almost family friendly, coming of age, sci-fi movie (with lightsabers). It feels like director Shawn Levy, known for everything from Stranger Things to The Pink Panther to Night at the Museum to Free Guy and Lassie (and being Eugene’s brother) completely understands what it took to make a great 1980s Steven Spielberg sci-fi movie. It has spectacular special effects like you’d see in Guardians of the Galaxy, but they take a backseat to a story of relationships and second chances. It belongs alongside E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Explorers, The Last Starfighter, Starman, Flight of the Navigator, D.A.R.Y.L., and J.J. Abrams’ own 1980s tribute, Super 8.
Another pandemic delayed production finally makes its way to TV audiences this week. It’s the Syfy Channel series Resident Alien, based on the crazy-good Dark Horse Comics sci-fi/crime/mystery mash-up comics by Peter Hogan (2000 AD, Tom Strong) and Steve Parkhouse (Milkman Murders, Doctor Who)–first reviewed here at borg back in 2013. Airing Wednesday nights, the show stars Alan Tudyk as the extra-terrestrial hero who survives a ship crash on what was supposed to be a quick mission to Earth, Coneheads-style. Taking on the part of Dr. Harry Vanderspeigle, he is able to mask his appearance using his otherworldly powers. Like E.T. he just wants to go home, but he must wait until his friends come to find him in the town of Patience, Colorado, an Everwood-style small town full of medical crises that he must attend to after the town doctor is found dead. He gets pulled into a murder mystery, which he takes to like Agent Cooper in the town of Twin Peaks. It’s this police procedural drama-meets-sci-fi blend that is taken forward in the story.
Only mere seconds into Farmageddon—the next big production from frequent Oscar-winner and stop-motion pioneer Aardman Animations–and viewers will feel the pangs of their favorite classic Steven Spielberg movies, complete with a magical score that has all the beats of a John Williams-esque adventure, thanks to composer Tom Howe. This is a return to the lovable Aardman underdog Shaun the Sheep, star of several series and films who we last saw on the big screen in 2015’s Shaun the Sheep movie. But this time our lovable wooly hero encounters an alien visitor and the resulting effort by directors Will Becher and Richard Phelan with writers Jon Brown, Mark Burton, and Nick Park may be Aardman’s most effective, most lovable, and most far-reaching crowd-pleaser to date. A direct-to-Netflix presentation, it also stands a chance at being a contender for best full-length animated film at next year’s Oscars.
Shaun the Sheep steps in for Spielberg’s Elliott in this modern close encounter with a lovable extra-terrestrial named Lu-la, so adorable that she may even make Baby Yoda go “awww.” The impeccable stop-motion animation viewers expect from Aardman is here, as well as the cast of endearing anthropomorphic farm animals, but the heartfelt story, unthinkably successful chemistry between clay characters, exquisite visual effects, lighting, and cinematography, and an emotional score make for a triumph of sci-fi and family storytelling, proving a common language is not necessary to understand relationships between someone that might be a bit different. Here that’s a sheep and an alien, but the story is effective enough that kids (and attentive adults) will apply the message to everyone. In fact, Aardman proves language isn’t necessary at all–the story is told entirely without spoken English dialogue, relying on expressive visuals, animal voices, and sound effects, making it truly internationally (or intergalactically) enjoyable.
This fun new sci-fi/fantasy adventure begins with a dog guarding his sheep–a motley but crafty band who live at the farm including Shaun–followed by a great homage to Looney Toons classic barnyard antics as the show establishes the farmyard bond between sheep and dog and dog and man. The man and dog– The Farmer and Bitzer–show Aardman going back to its roots, what first made the filmmaker internationally known through its award-winning shorts. Wallace and Gromit could be cousins to this man and dog duo, and anchoring the film with the ensemble here again (as with past Shaun stories) instead of going off in a different direction was a wise choice. It takes a special combination to merge classic animation with expert laugh-out-loud comedy situations, and the creators at Aardman are the closest thing I’ve ever seen to the spirit and creativity of Jim Henson. The story is sweet and can appeal to a variety of audiences. The older crowd can try to spot all the influences, and the young at heart can marvel at Farmageddon′s sheer joyous presentation.
If you’re not a player of Dungeons & Dragons, a new journey through the hills and valleys of the roleplay game that started it all will get you up to speed quickly. Dungeons & Dragons Art & Arcana: A Visual History is a comprehensive, authoritative, and licensed look back at nearly 50 years of gaming, storytelling, and artwork. If you grew up with the game you are certain to find both nostalgia and page-after-page of new information in its more than 700 color images from the past, images of heroes and villains, monsters and other creatures, that brought in some 40 million players over the years. Boasting some 10-15 million active players today, D&D now features the results of writers/D&D celebrity fans Michael Witwer (D&D historian), Kyle Newman (director of the movie Fanboys), Jon Peterson (game historian) and Sam Witwer (actor, Being Human, Smallville, Battlestar Galactica) pulling together published images and source art from each edition of D&D’s core books, supplements, and modules, magazines, advertisements, tie-in products, sketches, and draft rules. Their sources include the archives at Wizards of the Coast, private collectors, and more than 40 designers and artists from every era of the game’s history. Released in two editions, fans old and new can choose from the standard 448-page hardcover alone or a special edition Hydro74-designed boxed set with some intriguing extras. You’ll find a 14-page preview below courtesy of publisher Ten Speed Press.
This… treatise… this behemoth of a book is smartly designed so readers can approach it for a quick burst of throwback fun or a detailed dive behind the creation and many changes of the game and the companies behind it. You can find a side-by-side evolution and comparison of monsters and other characters, soak in old maps and character sheets, and compare the covers and key art across all editions. Possibly the best contribution is comparative images showing specific pop culture sources for many of the designs that made it into the early books and supplements, everything from Frank Frazetta Conan the Barbarian paintings to panels of comic book art from Marvel Comics’ Strange Tales.
From Guidon Games’ Chainmail to TSR to Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro and the latest 5th Edition rule books, the D&D story is one of corporate takeovers, failures, successes and strategies, all to survive and ultimately consolidate with games including Magic: The Gathering, Pokémon, World of Warcraft, and the entire Milton Bradley tabletop game catalog, all under one umbrella. It all started with creators Gary Gygax and David Arneson, and their efforts to build on miniature figure battle games from centuries past, and modern rules for gaming that had a historic source: sci-fi/fantasy author H.G. Wells first penned a gaming rulebook for miniatures titled Little Wars: a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys’ games and books, an influential book inspiring gaming to this day. The founders would pull in amateur artists and eventually professional artists, sprouting from a small headquarters in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, ultimately the source of Gen Con, the gaming convention that has been tied to D&D since the beginning.
I can’t hazard a guess as to how many times I have watched E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Probably a handful of times in 1982 and 1983, and at least once during a return to theaters in the past 35 years, plus a few times on VHS. What stood out today, watching the film as part of the Fathom Events and Turner Classic Movies 35th anniversary re-release screenings, is how ageless the film is. A teenager sitting behind me caught every single joke. In a time when parents don’t think to take their kids to classic film opportunities like this, the kids are truly missing a great experience. The film is a giant adventure story set in the backyard of a boy and his brother and sister. It’s relatable. Just check out Elliott’s room. There’s a toy Star Destroyer on the table. A TIE Fighter across the room. He carefully explains who Greedo, Hammerhead, Walrus Man, Snaggletooth, Lando, and Boba Fett are to E.T. And that advance LEGO builder set on the shelf. How many kids’ homes today, after all these years, still look so similar? And someone nearby is getting ready to dress up as Yoda, or a character from his neighborhood, in only a few weeks, much like the kid E.T. tries to run off with on Halloween.
It’s not only relatable, it’s about that subject that sci-fi does best when done right: Communication. Last year’s acclaimed sci-fi film Arrival was all about it, but does it reach into each of us like E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial has? We celebrated one of the best episodes of television this year here at borg.com, discussing the 25th anniversary of one of the greatest of all Star Trek episodes, Darmok from The Next Generation, a story entirely about the practical, real-world difficulty of communication. Elliott, played so well by Henry Thomas, and later Gertie, played equally well by the younger Drew Barrymore, each use what knowledge a little kid has to try to relate to an outsider. And we immediately see the problems–the barriers–that get in the way. Elliott tries to convey to the very curious new alien visitor so willing to learn that this giant object is a peanut. “You eat them, only you can’t eat this one because it’s not real.” He’s describing a bank that was made to look like a peanut. He then puts money in it. And the result: E.T. next tries to eat a toy car. Just as Dathon and Picard found, communication isn’t all that easy. Only when Gertie gets her only one-on-one opportunity, of the three kids she is the one who helps E.T. gain his vocabulary. The innocent and the youngest and the most awestruck. And she’s also the first to understand he is trying to phone home. Communication is difficult sometimes, but if kids can figure this out, what can adults do?
This week’s release was the original cut, as seen in theaters in 1982, not with any modifications. This is the first time the film has screened in theaters since the death of writer Melissa Mathison in 2015 (you might not have seen the laserdisc version of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, the only version ever released to feature Mathison’s then kinda-sorta well-known boyfriend Harrison Ford in the shadows as Elliott’s principal, meeting Elliott’s mom Mary (Dee Wallace) after his frog rescue–a bad scene, justifiably deleted). I did not recall how much we see E.T. in the film’s first scene as he and other botanists search out samples. E.T. carefully digs up what appears to be a Redwood sapling. But I now understand what Spielberg was thinking in his later re-cut version. As a kid I thought the humans were the enemy and yet this time I found no evidence of the humans trying to do anything other than learn about E.T.–much like the humans in Close Encounters of the Third Kind were scientists attempting to communicate. In Close Encounters, the presence of weapons are to scare the public from the faked quarantine area. Maybe that was the purpose of the weapons in the original E.T. cut. But somehow the rifles seemed out-of-place when the kids were escaping on bikes, after E.T. dies, after showing all the adults desperately try to help, to save E.T, some even in tears. This was the differentiator of Spielberg’s alien films from those that came before–the same spirit that only a few years earlier guided scientists to launch a couple of records into space hoping to communicate with someone out there. So swapping out car phones or walkie talkies for rifles actually is consistent with the actions of the adults in the rest of the film. I also can understand why so many little kids look back on the film as scary. There’s plenty to scare little kids–those same things that scare E.T. throughout the film, as well as what might be many kids’ first introduction to death. But the scene is gracefully done, and three decades later it’s great to hear that the adults are clearly heard attempting all those real-world, life-saving techniques to save our new alien friend. Mathison masterfully blended a science fiction, a fantasy adventure, and a coming-of-age story all in one package.
Fans of the beloved Steven Spielberg film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial have only one more day to catch Steven Spielberg’s 1982 hit film in theaters. As part of the TCM Big Screen Classics and Fathom Events celebration of the 35th anniversary of some of the greatest films of all time, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial will be in theaters for only one more day via two screenings in hundreds of theaters nationwide.
You can still get tickets for one of two screenings showing locally Wednesday, September 20, 2017, at 2:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. For more information, to check theater availability, and to order tickets, check out the Fathom Events website here.
After unprecedented commercial success with Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Raiders of the Lost Ark, Steven Spielberg did the unthinkable, directing a fourth blockbuster that would outperform them all, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial saw the big screen breakout roles of Drew Barrymore, Henry Thomas, and C. Thomas Howell. Nominated for nine Academy Awards, it would take home four awards, for John Williams’ vibrant score, for sound, visual effects, and sound effects editing. The film is the only movie from the 1980s that is among the top 50 all-time box office record-holders, currently holding its place at#15.
For me, Close Encounters of the Third Kind was the film that got away. I was lucky to have been taken to every great sci-fi classic and Spielberg film from Jaws forward, but multiple Star Wars viewings probably nudged out my chance to see this one back in 1977. Close Encounters didn’t arrive in theaters until the Christmas season that year and it would likely have generated some nightmares as I was only about a year older than the boy co-star of the film–so it was probably a good thing. Close Encounters of the Third Kind is back in theaters this week to celebrate its 40th anniversary. Watching it for the first time on the big screen was like filling in a last brick in the wall. It’s a satisfying re-watch, and every time you screen a classic in the theater again you learn something new. The film is being preceded this week by a behind-the-scenes featurette, including an interview with Steven Spielberg and excerpts from the home movies he routinely films as he directs his movies. It also contains a clip of each iconic scene in the film, so those who haven’t seen the film and want to view it for the first time may want to duck out for popcorn during the previews. Close Encounters is screening only for a few more days, so no matter how many times you have seen it, it’s time to go back again. Nothing beats a classic, especially a Spielberg film, on the big screen.
You might find Close Encounters’ pacing to stand out as a bit slow. Movies today need to be action-packed to grab viewers. The elements the viewer needs to know are laid out methodically, and yet the film is not told in normal storytelling fashion. Richard Dreyfuss’s innocent everyman Roy Neary is not your normal protagonist. Every bit the victim here, he also may be more like a lottery winner, selected to do what many dream of. He asks for none of the personal invasion he encounters–ripped from his family and job, this uncontrollable compulsion arrives, pursuing him with only a realization that whatever this vision is about it’s somehow important. From the film’s abrupt start it feels very avant-garde, a bit like modern independent filmmaking, with its back and forth explanation of a communication project in progress spliced with a utility worker who experiences a strange event. Sequences of real world end-to-end conversations that other directors might have edited to more quickly get to the point also illustrate unusual directing decisions. Only in what doubles as a horror movie sequence–basically a child abduction–do we get a clear realization of aliens as one possible antagonist of the film. And when the movie really kicks in at Devil’s Tower the audience can see the international marriage of scientists and military is possibly another villain. Or is there a villain at all? Many scenes suggest dissonance itself is the culprit–all the barriers to clear communication that get in the way–the ongoing, pounding barrage of multiple interpreters in a single conversation, air traffic control operators speaking at once, Neary’s wife played by Teri Garr and her kids all talking or screaming or beating toys to pieces, Roy’s co-workers on the radio all speaking at once, a room full of scientists babbling at each other as they try to interpret these six repeated numbers beings sent to them from outer space, aliens playing rapid tones against humans doing the same. And the sound of all the toys turning on at once, the toys of little Barry (Cary Guffey) that wake up his mom Jillian, played by Oscar nominee Melinda Dillon, forcing her to join the story as a victim along with Roy. Then the resolution of conflict only arrives as the aliens and humans finally reach clarity with the tonal communication between them in the film’s climactic encounter. In the preview to the film, Spielberg mentions Pinocchio and Jiminy Cricket’s crooning “when you wish upon a star, makes no difference who you are” as his inspiration–what the film is all about. That familiar Disney motif is certainly present thanks to John Williams’ beautiful score. Maybe Roy is his own enemy–unable to break away from the influence of these beings? Or by following this calling does he rescue himself from a family that doesn’t understand or listen to him, and a mundane job and neighborhood of zombie-like suburbanites who always seem to be watching him?
Whatever the through line of the story is intended to be, the film is sweeping and enormous in scope, addressing subjects everyone can get sucked into: telepathy, conspiracy theories, all the UFO theories (from cattle mutilations to Area 51 to alien abductions and flying saucers), and unexplained phenomena (from missing people to the curious fascination of aliens with rummaging through refrigerators). It’s all there in this suspenseful package, all from this brilliant young filmmaker who said he and his cast just couldn’t wait to show everyone this great thing they had created. Hints at so many films are contained here that you could wonder if Spielberg starts generating every subsequent project idea by first watching Close Encounters: We see the young child’s parents terrified in their home by some strange force in Poltergeist as Jillian tries to prevent the aliens from breaking into her home. We see the quiet standing crowd at night waiting at the foot of Devil’s Tower for something good or bad to happen filmed similar to the soldiers waiting as the Ark is opened at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. And it’s almost a surprise to realize the mother ship at the end of Close Encounters is not the ship from E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial, another giant, flying, lit-up Christmas tree-house transporting that curious little botanist who would arrive only five years later.
After unprecedented commercial success with Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Raiders of the Lost Ark, Steven Spielberg did the unthinkable, directing a fourth blockbuster that would outperform them all, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. And it happened over that magical Summer of 1982. On its way to proving that 2017 may be the biggest year of returning classic films to the theater, Turner Classic Movies and Fathom Events are partnering again as part of their TCM Big Screen Classics Series to bring E.T. back to the big screen.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial saw the big screen breakout roles of Drew Barrymore, Henry Thomas, and C. Thomas Howell. Nominated for nine Academy Awards, it would take home four awards, for John Williams’ vibrant score, for sound, visual effects, and sound effects editing. The film is the only movie from the 1980s that is among the top 50 all-time box office record-holders, currently holding its place at#15.
Phone Home. Be good. I’ll be right here.
The 35th anniversary screenings of E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial will be the first nationwide re-release of the film in 15 years. The original theatrical version will be presented at four screenings, which will include a special commentary by TCM Primetime Host Ben Mankiewicz.
Universal Pictures Home Entertainment also celebrates the film’s anniversary with a special gift set, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial 35th Anniversary Limited Edition on 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray™+ Digital, available on September 12.
